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Frontier Communications is getting sued by record labels for not disconnecting pirates

Frontier Communications, an ISP that serves around 3 million subscribers, has been sued by Warner, Sony, and Universal’s record labels for allegedly not taking action against its users who pirate music (via Ars Technica). The record labels allege in their complaint (PDF) that not only did Frontier fail to disconnect people who repeatedly pirated, but… Read more

Intel Offers $2 Billion for RISC-V Chip Startup SiFive: Bloomberg

Home News (Image credit: Intel) According to Bloomberg’s sources, Intel has offered $2 billion for startup chip designer SiFive, though neither company has officially acknowledged the offer. SiFive is the leading designer of chips based on the open source RISC-V architecture that has coincidentally attracted much more interest in the wake of Nvidia’s ongoing acquisition… Read more

Average GPU Pricing Skyrockets as Market Quadruples to $12.1 Billion, Report Says

Home News (Image credit: MSI) Discrete GPU suppliers for desktop PCs nearly quadrupled the cash they raked in during Q1 2021 compared to this time last year. That’s due to the skyrocketing increases in average selling prices (ASPs), according to Jon Peddie Research. Nvidia retained its leadership and outsold its rival AMD four-to-one in the discrete… Read more

Uber offers to pay for drivers’ health insurance, and then yanks it away

Uber mistakenly sent out an email to some of its drivers and delivery workers last month offering to cover some of their health insurance costs — only to revoke the offer two weeks later. On May 26th, an email from Uber with the enticing subject line “It’s a great time to get health coverage” appeared… Read more

The Hoover Dam reservoir is at an all-time low

Lake Mead, the reservoir created by the Hoover Dam, that feeds water to 25 million people across Western states, is historically low. On June 9th, the water level dipped to 1,071.57 feet above sea level, narrowly beating a record low last set in 2016. The lake surface has dropped 140 feet since 2000, leaving the… Read more

Xbox Is Making Streaming Hardware, Already Working on Next Consoles

Home News (Image credit: Xbox) Ahead of E3 Microsoft and Xbox are putting a heavy emphasis on cloud gaming and its Game Pass subscription program alongside its existing console ecosystem. This includes new, dedicated streaming hardware for any TV or monitor . It is also updating its cloud datacenters to use the Xbox Series X… Read more

Inside the cryptocurrency scam vortex

On May 22nd, a crypto finance project called DeFi100 posted a message to its website: “We scammed you guys and you can’t do shit about it. HA HA. All you moon bois have been scammed and you can’t do shit about it.” Screenshots of the message immediately went viral on crypto Twitter (always anarchic, easily… Read more

You’ll soon be able to try Xbox games before downloading them

Microsoft is planning to let Xbox console owners try games before they download them later this year. The new Xbox dashboard feature will allow console players to stream games through Microsoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming (xCloud) service instantly. It’s part of a push to integrate xCloud more into Xbox consoles and into the Xbox app on… Read more

The Senate just advanced the beef between SpaceX and Blue Origin

A controversial amendment pushed by Jeff Bezos’ space firm Blue Origin passed the Senate Wednesday night, inching closer to becoming law. Crammed inside a mammoth science and technology bill designed primarily to counter competition from China, the amendment would allow NASA to spend up to $10 billion on its embattled Moon lander program. Aside from… Read more

Facebook plans first smartwatch for next summer with two cameras, heart rate monitor

Facebook is taking a novel approach to its first smartwatch, which the company hasn’t confirmed publicly but currently plans to debut next summer. The device will feature a display with two cameras that can be detached from the wrist for taking pictures and videos that can be shared across Facebook’s suite of apps, including Instagram,… Read more

Adata Attacked by Ragnar Locker Ransomware Group, Data Reportedly Stolen

Home News (Image credit: Shutterstock) Ragnar Locker has claimed another victim. BleepingComputer reported yesterday that the ransomware group forced Adata to take its systems offline in May. Even though Adata says it has since resumed normal operations, the group claims that it was able to steal 1.5TB of data before the company detected its attack…. Read more

TikTok hired some of its best animators for an anti-bullying campaign

Starting today, you might see some beautiful new animations posted to TikTok’s accounts. The company has partnered with six of its platform’s popular animators — several of whom were featured in The Verge last year — to make videos for a campaign against bullying. The videos were all written and created by the animators and… Read more

The pandemic might cut down e-waste but widen the digital divide

We now have evidence that staying home to game or stream and chill during the pandemic was pretty much a first-world problem (or privilege, depending on how you look at it). The proof is in a new report published today by the United Nations University and UN Institute for Training and Research that looks at… Read more

The US wants to fix its broken lithium battery supply chain

The US announced plans to build out a domestic supply chain for lithium batteries, which are critical for electric vehicles and renewable energy. Its new goal is to be able to do nearly everything — from mining to manufacturing and recycling batteries — within its borders by the end of the decade. If it fails,… Read more

Nvidia Increases Market Share as GPU Sales Explode: JPR

Home News (Image credit: AMD) According to IDC, PC sales in the first quarter were up 55% year-over-year, and since the demand for personal computers is growing, component sales in Q1 2021 were high, too. Jon Peddie Research reports that shipments of integrated and standalone graphics processing units (GPUs) for PCs increased 38.74% year-over-year in the… Read more